Cliff Martinez

For the new 5:4 mixtape, i’ve turned to that which is closest to us all: the human body. Not a particularly promising theme, you might think, but once i began digging through my music library the sheer quantity of body references quickly became overwhelming (take your pick whether that says something about music in general or my collection in particular). i’ve structured the mix in four sections, each begun with a track concerning the whole body: part one rises from the feet up to the waist and hips, part two moves up the arms from the fingertips to the shoulders and chest, then there’s an interlude focusing on the heart (the only part of the mix to delve inside the body), and finally part three ascends from the chin to the top of the head. Appropriately enough for a body-oriented mix, it’s a little tongue-in-cheek from time to time, and because of what i wanted to include i’ve relaxed my usual rule of only featuring an artist once.

Even more than is usually the case, the new 5:4 Mixtape is a pure stream of consciousness. i’ve returned to a theme i explored in one of the earliest mixtapes, miniatures, once again setting myself a limit of music lasting under two minutes. With a shortlist of 100+ tracks (each one a personal favourite), i then simply followed my nose, treating them as puzzle pieces for a newly-created jigsaw, or perhaps more accurately as tessera for an eccentric aural mosaic. As usual, they embrace a mixture of new and old, and stylistically it’s all over the place, though its narrative was entirely suggested by the material, sometimes dovetailing or morphing, elsewhere successive tracks acting as rude non sequiturs. Along the way you’ll encounter abrasion (AlejandroJodorowsky, Naked City, Benjamin Wallfisch (whose IT soundtrack is gleefully insane), aTelecine), playfulness (Syd Dale, Andrew Liles, Camille), moody atmospheres (Laura Sheeran, Supersilent, Vangelis, Olga Neuwirth, Beacon, Gareth Davis & Machinefabriek, Alva Noto, Ben Lukas Boysen), edgy lyricism (Zola Jesus, Elsiane, Gazelle Twin, Clark, Jenny Hval), convoluted beats (Don Davis, Zavoloka & AGF, The Flashbulb, Derek K Jeppsen, Shad[]wb[]x, Ryoji Ikeda), drama of various hues (James Newton Howard, Peter Ablinger, Veli-Matti Puumala, Claude Vivier), dreamy ambient (Bad Loop, The Real Tuesday Weld, Cliff Martinez, Get Well Soon, Monty Adkins, Aphex Twin), rich tonal yum (Marcel Dupré, Carpenters, Cyrillus Kreek, Tõnu Kõrvits) and various other electronic, experimental or otherwise unconventional amuse-bouches (Francis Dhomont, Frank Zappa, Nicolas Obouhow, Andrew Lloyd Webber (yes, really), Sophie, Steve Levine, John Zorn, Kenneth Kirschner). And all of this in just one hour.

48 tiny tracks ranging in duration from 1’59” to a mere 26 seconds. Here’s the tracklisting in full, together with links to obtain the music. As ever, the mix can be downloaded or streamed via MixCloud. Read more

i’m starting 2017 in the usual way, with a mixtape bringing together one track from each of the forty albums on my best of 2016 list. i’m sure posterity will come to regard last year as something of a trough in human history, but this mixtape does at least testify to the fact that it also contained some truly marvellous wonders. i hope you find these three hours of music a nice distillation of the aural magic that was made in 2016; links to buy each of the albums can be found in the last two days’ articles.

The mixtape can be downloaded or streamed via MixCloud; here’s the tracklistening in full: Read more

i want to say a big thank you to everyone who’s followed 5:4 in the last year, and especially to those of you who’ve posted comments and tweets in response. There are lots of exciting things planned for 2014, so watch this space.

In the meantime, continuing the 5:4 annual tradition, here’s the new mixtape, celebrating the music in my Best Albums of the Year list. A little something from each album, seamlessly stitched together and lasting a little under 3 hours. Enjoy!—and if you do enjoy what you hear, links to purchase the music can be found on the previous two days’ articles.

It’s some time since i’ve explored movie soundtracks on 5:4, but there have been three this year that have stood out from the crowd, all very far indeed from the conventions of cinematic swooshery. That in itself isn’t terribly surprising, as their respective films are, to differing degrees, at some remove from the generic Hollywood archetype. The first is from Franck Khalfoun’s striking remake of Maniac, the music being by French composer Rob (about whom i’ve been able to learn precisely nothing, although there’s an interview here). The film, featuring an astonishing performance from Elijah Wood as the titular antagonist (Wood is clearly at his best playing sick, depraved characters), is dark, claustrophobic, deeply unsettling and at times horribly unpleasant. Almost all of the action takes place at night—in downtown streets, car parks, subway stations, diners and bedrooms—resulting in a heavy emphasis on artificial light, both the garish glare of neon and the subdued ambiance of intimacy. Rob has responded to this with a wonderfully-judged electronic score, one that draws on the crude swagger of 70s and 80s synths, establishing a strong connection to cinema from that period, particularly the self-scored movies of John Carpenter. It’s not pastiche, though; Rob’s sources may be vintage, but his attention is in the present. Opening track ‘Doll’ serves to establish credentials and context; driven by an initially unclear pulse, its restraint and neutrality evokes the sense not just of a late night drive, but of a search, a hunt. Read more